Buy now or wait a little?

...2-3 months is essentially now. You can try to wait for (December) seasonal low car sales point. There is Toyota salesperson Diane here she can possibly help you find a car at the seasonal low.

Turkey Day Deals: Black Friday Is The Best Day To Buy A Car

TrueCar data shows savings of up to 23% off of sticker price on certain models

 

I seem to have a huge demand for the V v. Not much demand for the II or the III. If you decide on a II or III, My inventory's great (on V's too) and just zip me off an email!

I think my deals are great! How about a gray v II with mats set at $25,988?

 

Diane, Just another peer behind the veil sort of question here... What proportion of your v buyers already owned a Prius?

 

O the best of my recollection right now, I think so far half have.

 

I am sure my salesman was just pumping me up for my purchase, but I got the v package II. I just didn’t see the benefits between the III vs. the II. I wasn’t going to buy the top line package, because the only thing I wanted from that package was the additional sun roof, which I could live without.

I can say that there weren’t many on the lot to choose from. I would have thought that the demand would have been really high and the lot would be half priuses (or is that prii?). All three dealerships I went to had no more than three cars available on the lot to look at.

I never owned a Prius before. They seemed very expensive for the size. That is why the v seemed the perfect opportunity. It is not only my first Prius, but after 25 years of driving it is my first brand new car.

 

I just bought the Pruis v top of the line, about 30K. My son totaled the car we bought him so we had 10K to work with and needed a new car now. We had a 2005 Pruis that we really liked and it had 140K on it (my son got the old prius), so we decided to jump in and buy the new one. Money wasn't an overiding issue for us but timing was. The new Pruis v seems much roomier especially in the front seats and back seats so it's a true 4/5 person car. Still trying to get the phones to sync up. GPS is a huge improvement over the 2005. If you can wait and save more money, go for it.

 

I'm in no hurry here. I can wait 1 month, or 6 months if it'll make a difference in the deal I get.
When is the Toyotathon sales? Or is that mostly smoke and mirrors?

I saw last night online that a Toyo dealer 300 miles from me is showing a v 5 AT leaded out and they are listing it at 3,400 off of MSRP. Its on the big name car shopping website.
Now, when you open the page there, it says ....plus dealer fees, tax, tag, yada.
Question is, I wonder if its a bait and switch deal where they add a grand in dealer fee back on or not? If not, its a good deal. Not the color I really want, but if they'd get or do get the color I want, I'd go 300 miles to get it.

I read reviews on that dealership and it had 175 reviewers and it was rated a 4.7 out of 5 stars. There were even comments on other dealers an hour away from that one where they rated the other one poorly and left and went to THIS dealer and bought their car. It comes across like a HUGE dealership that works on big margin and slim profit and good customer service and might be worth looking into. I do get irritated when I find a dealer trying to bait me. Makes me mad and insults my intelligence.

 

A grand in dealer fees sounds extremely high. Typically they are a set value and you can just call them to find out what they are.
I'd ask if delivery is included in their dealer fee, or if it's already included in their advertised price.

 

Well, that may be a bit of an exageration. However, when truecar.com shows that the markup above cost ona fully loaded v to be 2800 and they are listing it at 3400 it makes me wonder.

Also, here in SC there is apparently no limit to dealer fees. I've seem dealers charge as little as 0 or 200, and up to 550 in my limited experience. This car is out of state though and I do not know what their laws are. I understand Cali limits it.
Also, it mentioned something about charging for dealer ad ons? I forgot how it worded it. ie, maybe they could say well we added fabric protection to the seats so thats included now at additional 400. I do not know, but I do know I wouldn't pay for that junk.

 

The disclaimer in the listing on the big car search website is this

All prices plus dealer fee, tax, tag and Title fees.Prices are subject to change without notice. No price is final until approved by the dealer. The pricing that appears does not include any options that may have been installed at the dealership. Selection of incentives or special APR promotions may affect final selling price. Specifications, standard features and available equipment are based upon information available at the time of posting, and are subject to change without notice.

That seems to leave the door open a bit.
With that said, their dealership rating on the review site was just about the best I could find with tons of super happy buyers and no complaints that I could locate.

 

I called the dealer and he was surprised to hear they had a listing that far below MSRP. He said they were selling them for $2,000 ABOVE MSRP.

Do I have any leg to stand on that they would have to sell me the car for that listed price?

 

If a car dealership has a saleman who lies like that so blatantly, I wouldn't even think about giving them the satisfaction of my business. I can imagine a few people with disposable income or a few gullible ones paying 2k over MSRP, but to generalize it like that is pretty much the same as lying to me.

Just a quick anecdote, dealership A actually matched the below invoice price of dealership B (the dealership I ended up purchasing from). Even though dealership A was about 45 miles closer to my, home, I went with B because the salesman at dealership A was a complete donkey giving me the run around and trying to plague my mind with information that was not even related to the purchase, probably using some sleazy salesman tactics to get me to stay on the lot and chat longer... I even told him I did not have time for this several times. Needless to say, I feel I made the right decision because the time it took me to drive the 90 miles extra back and forth was worth the quick and painless 1 hour and 15 minute transaction. I have no doubt I would have sat at dealership A for at least 3-4 hours if I had gone with them, plus all the headache of talking to an donkey.

Sorry for the rambling, your comment about 2k over MSRP really got my engine going, I hate douchebag sales people like that. Also, after reading your comment, to me, the ad you saw is clearly a bait and switch tactic.

 

Normally I would totally agree with you and have felt exactly the same. I do not get the impression that he was playing games or using a tactic actually (surprisingly as I'm usually very cautious and keen to that sort of thing). He was surprised and said I was the first person who has called about it. He said he'd let someone know right away to change it.

Sure enough, about 1 hour later I refreshed the page and it now shows MSRP at 37,4xx and selling price is 39,4xx updated on the "big car search" website. (wont name it, might not like that here, I do not know).

Anyhow, its all strange, but I get the feeling they screwed up. But I am also at the same time surprised that they are "selling" them at 2K over. He said they had 8 and now have just one or 2 left.

 

Ok now that I've calmed down a little... here is my logic and advice to you.

If they truly sold 6 out of 8 Prius vs for 2k over MSRP (or close to it), then they wouldn't want to negotiate with you because they could probably find more suckers to pay the big premium.

If they are "stretching the truth" about 2k over MSRP, then you don't want to deal with them anyway because... well, refer to my previous post

Either way, you win by not going IMO.

 

Oh I'm calm, and my heart chuckled a little when he said 2K over MSRP. I wont pay MSRP for any car.

Aside from that, I wouldnt go taking off down there tto argue. I was just asking if there is any way I could hold them to the price.

 

I haven't bought a car, new or otherwise, from a dealer in 30 years. I dread the thought of it. Is Costco a good way to go?

 

Bought a v5 with AT. I tried Costco and they told me Toyota would not give the Prius v to them in their program. Interesting. The person I spoke with said "what's with this Prius v? I'm getting so many calls on it". I used USAA and found out that they charge dealers $400. So I got the Truecar "great price" from USAA's "certified" dealers, then emailed every dealer in my state to get their best price. MSRP on my v5 with AT was $36624 and I paid $34900.